


Prompt: Lies are the nails in the coffin truth made

by RoseDemica



Series: Random One Shots (Avengers) [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Major character death - Freeform, Miscarriage, Miscarriage mention, Prompt Fic, Sister Agents, The Rise of Thanos, Torture, makes me cry, more explanation in notes, the fall of loki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:41:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26036581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoseDemica/pseuds/RoseDemica
Summary: Warning! Character Death! Torture!I wrote this as a prompt, but it makes me so sad that I renamed it 'AU, Because F*** You' in my notes. I love it, but I hate it. (The swearing is directed at myself btw, not anyone else).A mission gone wrong... Clint and Iris captured... Will they escape this time?
Relationships: Clint Barton/Iris Coulson-Fury, Clint Barton/OC
Series: Random One Shots (Avengers) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1904695
Kudos: 1





	Prompt: Lies are the nails in the coffin truth made

**Author's Note:**

> Heya, 
> 
> I was given the prompt 'lies are the nails in the coffin truth made', and this is what came from that. 
> 
> It plays with the idea that one of the leaping points for my whole Marvel Universe went a different way. 
> 
> The torture isn't super graphic, its from one POV, and the torture is applied to the other person. If you don't feel comfortable reading it, then please don't. 
> 
> Also  
> Just a quick break down of the torture and death. Spoilers for the fic, so feel free to skip past if you want. 
> 
> Character Death: Iris Coulson-Fury.  
> Torture: Stabbing, hanging by arms, watching loved one die, buried alive, mental torture.

Clint couldn't pinpoint where it all went wrong. It could have been when Dr. Rowland, the only doctor that had a high enough clearance level to know the full details of Natasha's past and upbringing said she wasn't mission fit. It was a true testament to how much they trusted him that neither argued, although it had Iris worried about how bad her best friend was when she simply shrugged and went straight to her bunk. Clint had been quick to reassure Iris that she was most likely still in pain from the bullet that had gone * _ through _ * her right thigh not two weeks prior.    
  
Iris had been assigned to be his partner, despite the fact she had just come back from four consecutive missions with no down time between them. Clint had seen the concerned look Phil and Fury had shared behind their adopted daughters back. She was running herself to the ground, and no one seemed to know why.   
  
His fingers brushed by her back as they left the debriefing room, and she flinched away from him. Refusing to meet his eyes as she walked away, leaving him alone in the hallway. In hindsight, that was a really big sign that she was uncomfortable being around him, but he'd thought nothing of it, she'd demanded to be his partner on the mission. It was his assumption that she wouldn't do that if she wanted to be nowhere near him.   
  
Now, chained to the floors and ceiling by thick metal chains, suspended in midair, they had nothing but time to think and talk, and considering Iris wasn't talking all that much, and he was more of the silent type, there'd been a lot of time for thinking.   
  
It was after the fourth round of torture from those that held them captive that Clint decided he'd had enough. They'd made sure that neither of the Shield Agents could escape from their bindings, forewarned enough to never let either down, or loosen the restraints that were tugging their shoulders back at a painful and unnatural angle.   
  
"Iris, baby, talk to me." Clint whispered, ignoring the harsh pull on his vocal chords. The screams that had been torn from his throat combined with the lack of water was making holding a conversation harder than it should have been. A choked sob escaped her lips, and he fought against the chains holding him back from her, wanting her in his arms.   
  
"Please Baby." He pleaded, watching her turn slowly, her golden eyes refusing to meet his, instead focused on his bare torso, and the deep cuts that marred his skin. "Iris, look at me." He hardened his voice, and her head snapped up automatically, eyes locking on his.   
  
"What's wrong?" His voice softened again, waiting for her answer. Tears sprung up in her eyes, but she didn't look away from him.   
  
"Clint, I can't, please don't make me tell you." Her breath caught on her words, tears streaming down her face and into the cuts that littered her body.    
  
"Baby." He whispered, knowing she wouldn't need any more coaxing. She glanced downward, her body seeming to sag further from her arms, even though it wasn't possible.   
  
"I was pregnant. I found out when I was deep undercover while you were in New Mexico. I couldn't get a message out to the girls, or even to you, by the time I got out it was too late. I'd lost it, Dr Richmond and I can't figure out how I got pregnant. It shouldn't have been possible, but I was, and then." Iris choked back a sob, her arms straining against the chains, an instinctive reaction to hug her stomach.   
  
"I could hear it growing inside me and then it just wasn't. I'm so so sorry." She wouldn't look up at him, even as he tugged at the chains with all his strength, praying they would break so he could get to her.   
  
"Ri, baby, look at me." He knew tears were glistening in his own eyes, his arms giving out and leaving him hanging limply by his sore shoulders, but he kept enough strength to lift his head up and make eye contact with her.   
  
"It's not your fault, I don't blame you, and I am so sorry I wasn't there with you during this." She sobbed again, her head dropping so her chin rested against her chest.   
  
"Ri, I love you, and nothing will ever stop me from loving you, and damn it, if I wasn't chained up right now I'd be holding you so close and never letting you go." He fought against the chains once more, hearing the clip that suspended him creak slightly.   
  
"If I had just said no to the damn undercover mission it would have been fine, this is my fault." He barely heard her whisper, the door opening before he could rebuff her words.   
  
"You two feeling chatty?" A dark chuckle accompanied the male's words as he stepped into the room. Iris paid him no mind, neither did Clint, holding her gaze even as he heard the sound of knives being sharpened.    
  
"No? Too bad." Iris didn't even flinch as the knife pierced her side, carefully sliding between her two lowest ribs on the left hand side. The fight flooding from her golden eyes as they fell shut.   
  
"Ri, don't you dare give up on me." Clint spat, watching for the slow rise and fall of her chest that would indicate she was still breathing.    
  
"Now that's no fun." Clint turned his glare on the brown haired male, eyes daring him to make another move. The man only chuckled, slowly pulling the blade from her side, before shoving it back in roughly. Seeming to be rather upset that she still didn't cry out in pain. His hand, soaking in her blood tangled in her hair, tugging it back to expose her neck. Reaching for another knife off the table behind him. Iris gasped, her eyes flying open, face distorting in pain as both her bonds and wounds were pulled at.    
  
"I will have you screaming my name beautiful, one way or another." Clint tugged harder, needing to be free, needing to get to her before he did anything else.   
  
"I will never." Iris spat, twisting her head away from him, ignoring the metal that sliced across the skin of her neck, blood spilling down her chest momentarily before the cut healed over.   
  
"Ooh, that's new." The blade clattered to the floor, forgotten as fingers traced over where she should have a cut. Iris fought to get her head free, but winced as the grip in her hair tightened, stopping her movements.   
  
"I wonder..." The knife from her side was pulled free, spinning around his fingers before he placed a series of small cuts over her neck, watching as they healed again under his watchful eyes and probing fingers. Too distracted to notice Clint working furiously at his bonds, finally able to feel the metal giving way.    
  
"I have a better idea!" The male released Iris, forcing Clint to stop his own movements, in case he was discovered too soon. Iris gasped for breath, her head snapping back to its normal way of resting. Ignoring the still warm blood that covered her neck and collarbone.   
  
"Iris, look at me." Clint whispered, waiting for her golden eyes to flick up to his. He could see the strain it was taking on her to remain conscious. Keep her eyes locked on him despite the drain healing herself was taking. "I'll get us out of this. I love you. Keep fighting, don't you dare-" Iris' eyes rolled back in her head,    
  
"IRIS!" Clint practically screamed, his whole body being jerked backwards as he lunged for her, pulled back violently by the chains. A dark chuckle had him glaring daggers towards the man in the doorway, refusing to let his emotions show as he saw the two huge needles filled with a light blue liquid in his hand.   
  
"Aww, did we lose the pretty one so soon." A pout tugged at the man's lips, putting one of the needles down, and moving towards Iris.   
  
"STAY AWAY FROM MY WIFE!" Clint snarled, trying to lunge for him only to get caught by the chains once more.   
  
"Your wife?" The guy chuckled, his brown eyes flickering between Clint and Iris, a glint in them Clint didn't like at all.    
  
"Stay away from her." Clint repeated, straining at the chains that held him to the roof.   
  
"Or what? You can't touch me." As if to prove his point, he ran a finger down Iris' chest. Clint couldn't help the primitive growl that rumbled through his chest. She was his to protect damnit! He wouldn't fail her again.   
  
"Sorry big boy, I'm just having too much fun." Clint couldn't see what was being done behind Iris' back, but judging by the gasp that left her lips, it wasn't anything good. Clint couldn't help but growl again, especially when the needle came back into view void of liquid and coated in blood.   
  
"Calm down, your turn now." He didn't hesitate to pick up the needle, walking behind Clint and slipping into his spine. Clint fought against the drug, but still found himself succumbing to the darkness, able to feel the chains that held him being loosened, and removed, but unable to see or move to fight back.   
  
Clint groaned, his head throbbing painfully under the false LED lights that were shining in his face. Clint groaned, trying to bat away the lights, and the hands shaking him violently, the jolt against his shoulders brought him crashing back down to earth.   
  
"Oh good, finally. I thought of a fun game while you were out." Clint forced his eyes to open, only to slam them shut again when he realised just how close the psychopath was to him. Clint waited a moment before opening his eyes again thankful that the brown eyes had been removed from his field of vision.   
  
"Where is she?" He forced himself to ask, ignoring the searing burn in his throat. A dark chuckle was the only reply as his head snapped around, looking for Iris, praying she was alright.   
  
"Wanna hear my game? Of course you do. Seeing as my knife games weren't working, I came up with something a little more.... inventive." There was a pause as he stepped back into view. Masked men carried a coffin into view, the lid slightly opened, but they paid it no mind as they put it on top of two thick pieces of rope, hovering it over a freshly dug hole in the ground.   
  
"I've put your pretty little wife in the coffin here, and for every lie you tell me, I put another nail in it to hold the lid down. If you go more than two minutes without telling me what I want to hear, I put another nail in the coffin. When I run out of nails, we lower it down and I start with shovel loads of dirt. I get what I want. I let you go, and you can be the knight in shining armour and save her." As if to prove his point, he lifted Iris up by her hair, showing Clint she really was in the wooden casket. Clint didn't know whether to be worried or relieved that she wasn't awake for this.   
  
"Tell me big boy, how long can she survive without oxygen for?" Being buried alive was Iris' worst fear, being able to hear her body shutting down from a lack of oxygen. There was no way this creep could know that, Iris hadn't told anyone, he only knew because they got trapped in an airlock on the helicarrier and she nearly had a panic attack.    
  
"Who will you prove more loyal to? Your boss? Or your wife?" Iris opened her eyes, golden orbs flicking to him. What he saw broke his heart, she had given up, there was none of the usual spark in her eyes, they didn't dance or light up when she looked at him. She had had enough, she was begging for him to let her die, protect Shield at all costs.    
  
"Ri, baby, no, don't you dare." She ignored him, her eyes shutting and her body going limp.   
  
"IRIS!" Clint fought against the ropes that held his arms behind his back, bark of the tree rubbing into his bare back.    
  
"No, please no! IRIS!" Shield couldn't be too far away, someone would have gotten suspicious by now. Iris never missed a check in. He just had to hold out.   
  
"Glad I have your attention." He released Iris, and she fell back into the box with a loud thump.    
  
"Let her go you creep!" Clint felt the unnatural tug of his shoulder as he dislocated it, the searing pain pulling forth a yell from his throat, stopping his struggles to get free.   
  
"That's karma for you. Now." Large hands picked up a hammer and nails."Two minutes." He sing songed, pulling the case closed and driving one nail in with one strong hit - he'd done this before. Clint waited for Iris' scared gasp, for her to freak out and worry.   
  
"IRIS! DON'T YOU DARE LEAVE ME!" Clint screamed, praying that she would fight back, that she wouldn't give up so easily.   
  
"Baby, I know you're tired, I know you've had enough, but please baby, I need you." The pain in his shoulder was dulled enough by adrenaline that he could keep fighting. Moving his wrists against the tree bark in an effort to fray the ropes enough to tear them. He couldn't fail her, he couldn't leave her to die in the only way she feared.   
  
"Another two minutes. Start talking big boy." Another nail driven home, another obstacle between him and his wife, another thing to overcome before he could take her home.   
  
"IRIS!" His yell broke off into a choked sob, tears blurring his vision before he blinked them away, just because she had given up didn't mean he would. Clint saw him raise another nail towards the would, eyes trained on his watch.   
  
"Stop! Please, just stop! What do you want to know?" Clint knew his weakness, he knew it was her, he would do anything for her.   
  
"Two nails. I really expected better from you lover boy." Clint shuddered when he heard the term pass his captor's lips. Iris used to call him that, before he was an agent. It didn't sound the same falling from anyone else's lips. He drove the nail home regardless.   
  
"Two minutes, figure it out." Clint frowned, figure what out. They'd never been asked any specific questions, just tortured.   
  
"We're government agents." He stated, it was a start, it was the truth.   
  
"I'm not interested in that." Another nail pinning Iris in.   
  
"It's not a lie!" Clint protested, only to get a shrug in reply.   
  
"Is to me."    
  
"International Spies on loan to the CIA from China." Clint offered, his lips twisting upwards in a smirk as he finally got some response from the ropes. Another nail into the dead wood coffin. He just had to buy more time.   
  
"I know how to turn anything into a weapon. Even stuffed animals." Another nail. Clint winced as he forced his shoulder back against the tree. Roughly shoving it back into place. It wasn't enough, but it would hold for now.   
  
"Her fathers are the director and right hand man of an entire secret government agency. She's worth more to you alive!" There was a slight hesitation, before two more nails were driven into the coffin. It was enough time to hear Iris start gasping for air, her body automatically responding to the fear of being buried alive.    
  
"She's terrified of spiders! Especially Black Widows!" Clint lied through his teeth, relieved to see that no more nails were driven home. Instead his body turned towards him, fascinated.   
  
"She can't cook to save her life." Clint winced, his eyes squeezing shut as another small piece of metal was placed between him and the woman he loved.   
  
"Is there even a reason you're torturing us? Do you actually want to know anything?" Clint demanded, feeling himself getting angry at the mere thought of it. The man didn't answer, motioning to his bare wrist as he drove in another nail.   
  
"You don't do you!? You just want to watch us suffer." Another nail, "No, not us, me. What did I ever do to you? I don't even know you." Another.   
  
"I do know you?" A pause, Clint frowned, trying to remember, wincing when he heard the sound of another nail, his two minutes up. Twelve, he wasn't quite sure how much longer he had before the dirt started.   
  
"I killed someone you love." A nail drove home, more force behind this one. No, not loved, hated.   
  
"Abusive father?" Fourteen.    
  
"CLINT!" Iris' scream door through the air, her sobs reaching him despite the box that caged her. She was fighting, she was using her precious air to scream for him.   
  
"Tick Tock Hawkboy." Fifteen.   
  
"The circus." No response, all Clint could hear was her sobs. It brought him more time.   
  
"You can't be Barney, he's long gone." Clint couldn't think, not with her cries ringing in his ears, he'd banished most of his memories of the circus, they were too painful. Sixteen.   
  
"Trickshots bastard son, his supposed protege." Clint spat, fighting the urge to smile when he saw all the man's muscles tense. The hand on the hammer faltering.   
  
"Of course, he replaced you with me, and proclaimed me the son he never had. You were cast aside. You want to take everything from me, like you think I took everything from you." Seventeen.   
  
"You did take everything from me." He spat, driving in another nail out of spite. Eighteen.    
  
"And now I will return the favour. Force you to watch as your world crumbles around you." Nineteen. Twenty. The coffin started to lower. Clint felt the rage boiling in his bones.   
  
"Like when my brother stabbed me and left me to die in an alleyway! When your father, my mentor and my brother tried to kill me. I had nothing then When I was forced to live on the streets, begging and stealing anything that I could to eat! When I was taken in by a gang and forced to kill for a living. When I got so good at it it was all I could do!? My life has never not been shambles, it crumbles around me all the damn time, and you want to take away the one good thing I was given!? You can't kill my angel." He paid Clint no mind, motioning for the coffin to be buried. The men that had carried it instantly stepped forward, shovels in hand to pile dirt back down ontop of it.   
  
Clint strained against the ropes, he was so close, he could feel it. He just needed more time, he just needed them to stop.   
  
"IRIS! NO! STOP! PLEASE! IRIS!!" His cries were ignored, he couldn't watch, his head turning to the side, eyes squeezing shut. He needed more time, he needed to be quicker. He couldn't lose her.   
  
"See Hawkboy, the only way for me to get what I want, is for her to die. Once she's fully buried, I'll keep my word. I'll let you go, watch as you fail to save her."   
  
"If she dies you may as well kill me aswell, because I won't live without her."    
  
"You'll have no choice." A hand gripped his cheeks, forcing his face back towards the hole, his eyes being held open.   
  
"Watch, can you hear her calling for you? Begging for you to do something, to save her." The voice whispered in his ear, glee dragged across every word. Laughter too loud, too close. Damnit! He needed more time.    
  
The ropes finally gave way, and he ignored the burn in his shoulder. Snapping the guys neck before he could raise the alarm. He had to get to Iris. The men burying her went down without a fight. Clint smashing the shovel into their heads before he jumped into the hole, shoveling the dirt back out quicker than he thought he could.   
  
The twenty nails weren't enough to keep him out when he wrestled the lid off the top, Iris had done some damage to her side in her frenzied panic. His arms scooped her up, placing her outside of the hole before he followed. Ignoring the strain on his shoulder, he didn't have time for it, he had to save her.    
  
His mud covered fingers pressed against her neck, searching for a pulse, keen gaze focussed on her chest, watching for the rise and fall of her gentle breaths. She hadn't been in there long enough to run out of oxygen, she had to be okay. Even he didn't understand the words that fell from his lips, unable to find a pulse and starting CPR, she had to be okay. This was his fault, he had to save her.    
  
"Open your eyes damnit Ri!" A hand touched his shoulder, but he shrugged it off, it didn't matter, nothing mattered except her opening her eyes.   
  
"Barton." Clint ignored the soft voice, fighting at the hands that pulled him away from her, he had to save her. She had to be okay, it was his fault.   
  
"Barton, she's gone." A woman got in his way, bright red hair seeming to glow in the dawn of a new day, blocking his view to her. He needed to see her, he had to save her.    
  
"GET AWAY FROM MY WIFE! IRIS!" Clint felt the pinch in his neck, before everything went dark.  _ *'Barton, she's gone.'* _


End file.
